The following is from an X/Twitter account that identifies herself as THE Based Trinity
. She is clearly a Roman Catholic, of the Latin Mass proclivity. And she was recently, or at some point, invited to a Protestant church service. Below I will provide her response to that experience, and then below that I will respectively present my response to her as I offered that on X.
I got invited to a Protestant “service.” Here’s how it all went down. The intro alone was 40 minutes of the “worship” band finding the resonant frequency of all my internal organs, making me queasy, with the zombies around me waving their hands in the air like they didn’t care (about actual scripture). This was followed by guilt tripping tithes and forced socialization, boomer women screaming commands at God to HEEEAAAHHHL IN JESUS NAME some specific congregants, a hot mess of a sermon with the theme of “don’t complain”, usurping parts of St. Paul’s epistles before boldly declaring “if you’re born again, ALL YOUR SINS ARE FORGIVEN!”, heaps of vain repetition (pastor making the congregation repeat every 6th or so line he calls out), and the good ole “altar call” where people go kneel before the worship band (prots like to call that idol worship when we do it). Not to mention the fact that I was repeatedly ambushed by everyone forcefully introducing theirselves – even when I was very obviously trying to maintain my sanity by quietly reading my Catholic Press prayer book. One lady tried shoving a visitor contact card in my face while I was doing so, and gave me this appalled dirty look when I politely declined. I’d gone to the 8am Mass beforehand, prayed my usual pre-Mass rosary, then prayed an extra rosary afterward.. but when I came out of that dentist’s office “church” I was ready to go to the noon Mass. I felt dirty and hollow and it broke my brain and my heart that while I was in there, everyone was lapping up the emotionally charged nonsense and waving their hands and muttering those “yes Jesus thank you Jesus Aaaaaymen” vain Protestant repetitions. Nothing has ever made me want to run back to my car and gun it to a TLM more than what I endured today. Of course, there was plenty of irony woven into the sermon. It pains me to see so many well meaning people who are so dangerously misled. Pray for them. We have to.
And my response:
As an evangelical I’d say this is an apt description of many evangelical church services in North America (although, “altar call?” if only most churches still did those). But yes, in my view, the evangelical churches have almost totally gone to seed; quite badly in fact. Even so, this does not necessarily entail that the Roman Catholics are the only or recommended alternative. It has its own problems—many in fact. What this does mean though, I think, is that evangelicalism shouldn’t be left on life support any longer by those of us who can feel this gal’s angst and emptiness, just the same. I don’t know what the way forward is for the evangelical churches (in name only). A return to simplicity and a Word focusedness is the only way I can really imagine. The Word for the Protestant, and the American evangelical as an ostensible subset, must shape the Protestant worship service; it must shape the body life of the church; it must be disentangled from this or that period of theological development and allow to stand on its own, within the history of its interpretation. Protestants, de jure, have a much surer way to offer than do the accretions found in Romanism. There is hope for the Protestant, a balm of Gilead available; and it must resound and find its ground in a theology of the Word of God alone as the esse of all that is real, and breathing and life giving. But I can resonate with this Catholic gal’s conclusion, in regard to the vanity of the evangelical churches. It’s just her antidote that is aloof.